A day of dog related shenanigans

(Boat Flamingo - posted by Cath)

First lock of the day has a guillotine gate at the bottom end.

We wanted to get away fairly early, in case we might be able to get somewhere down the other side of the summit - perhaps as far as Littleborough.

My phone alarm went off at 7:00 am, but I was a bit sluggish and found it hard to get moving. We went and thumped on the back hatch to let David know that we wanted to get moving, but we couldn't hear any answer to our shouts. We need David to get up, not just because he is essential on a heavily locked section like the one that we would be tackling today, but also because the boat tiller is kept in the back cabin, and that's also where the controls are - we can't move the boat without standing in David's bedroom.

The Great Wall of Todmorden looks even larger today, somehow.

It was grey, chilly and overcast, but we were spared the pouring rain that we had yesterday afternoon. We got away from the mooring at 8:30, then up through the guillotine lock - which I really don't like. It's probably fine, but it's a different technique to most locks, so that I spend all my time double-checking everything. 

Impressive railway viaduct crosses the locks at Gauxholme

In that first pound Flamingo got stuck for the first time. Approaching a bridge the boat grounded, and was just not moving, there was just too much debris on the bottom of the canal, and the pound was down a little bit. We all tried pushing and pulling, heaving on ropes, while trying to pole off the 'scour' - nothing happened, so I went up to the next lock, which was full, to empty the water into the pound. I didn't have a great deal of hope, but there was a chance that the water rushing down would 'flush' the boat up a little, and we could escape the scour. In fact, it was possible to get Flamingo moving slowly, and we pulled her through the bridge hole while David stood on the boat with the 'boat shaft' trying to keep the boat away from the off-side, which was particularly shallow. In this situation it is actually often counter-productive to use the engine, even gently. Once there is power to the propeller the back of the boat 'digs in' to the water, pulling down onto whatever it is we are trying to float off.

Not the best wet dog and wet jeans photo ever taken, but you get the idea.

Then, in the flight which climbs up out of Todmorden we had just got to the top of a lock, the gate was open, and the boat was in neutral. Flamingo was most of the way towards one side of the lock, ready to go out of one gate (in broad locks narrow boats should only need one gate opened). A young woman walked past with an attractive dog, so Odin went over to say 'hello'. Max was on the non-towpath side of the lock with me, but he saw this attractive dog and decided that he was going to say 'hello' too. This isn't usually a problem, but instead of running over the narrow bridge at the 'foot' of the lock, he decided to cross Flamingo by jumping onto the 'gap' then trying to jump from there to the other side of the lock - a distance of over 7 feet. He could probably have done this if he had got a run-up at it, or if it hadn't been slightly upwards too (the pound above the lock was slightly down, so the deck of Flamingo was lower than the side of the lock).

Lunch break at Walsden

Max doesn't know that he can swim, and the rise from the water to the level of the gap on Flamingo is more than 2 foot. Poor Max was frantically paddling, and trying to get back on the boat. I just couldn't reach, and whilst Alan could, he wasn't easily able to drag him out. In the end David managed to haul him out, while Alan hung onto David's belt to stop him from falling headlong into the canal too.

The higher you go, the better it gets.

Max celebrated being rescued by shaking and soaking us all with canal water, sufficiently badly in Alan's case decided to change his jeans to the pair from yesterday's rainfall that had still not dried out, as they were drier than the ones Max had left him with.

Then onwards, we stopped for an hour at Walsden to cook burgers for lunch - then onwards again.

It really is like no other canal we have ever travelled on.

As we neared the summit a young woman in a pink top ran past me. I walked under the next bridge and saw a large, grey-ish dog running in the other direction and disappearing around a bend. I just assumed that it was with a walker somewhere ahead of me. Then the young woman ran back past me again, ‘I’ve lost my dog,’ she said. ‘If it’s a large grey dog I saw it running that way,’ I answered, and she ran off to look for it.

Getting closer to the summit.

At the next lock I saw a different woman approaching from behind, with the grey dog. However, as I walked towards her the dog ran off again. I threw a lead to David who set off on the folding bike to try to catch the dog. While he was away the second woman explained that she had found the dog on the main road.

Typical bridge across tail of lock on approach to the summit.

David returned with the dog, which we tied securely to a post by the lock, and David set off again towards the summit in search of the young runner. Unfortunately, the dog didn’t have any contact information on its collar.

Alan and I worked through a couple more locks, dealing with problems when Flamingo got stuck in the run-in to the lock, and taking the dog with us each time we moved on to the next lock.

It is very hard to take photos that 
emphasise just how spectacular it is.

David eventually returned, having been some considerable distance down the other side of the summit, and having spoken to quite a few people. He’d been into the pub, and someone had posted a message on a local FB group. The pub had agreed to look after the dog if we didn’t find the owner.

Today's lost dog was attractive, and remarkably calm without its owner.

At just this point the runner came into view – she must have been completely frantic. She was very grateful that we had keep the dog with us, and was horrified that the dog had been found on the main road.

I just wish that she’d put her phone number on the dog’s collar.

It seems a remarkable coincidence that each time when travelling near the Rochdale summit we have spent time reuniting a lost dog with its owner, but that is exactly what we have now done in both directions.

Top lock at the Eastern end of the summit.

Many of the paddles on this section are extremely stiff. By the time we got to the Summit pub I was completely exhausted, although it was only 4:00 pm. We moored and Alan went off to investigate the state of the pounds on the southern side of the summit, several of which are currently empty. He went to as far Littleborough, where he found the other historic boaters who'd been waiting for lock 49 to be repaired (we've heard today that it is now fixed). They were using their time constructively by sprucing up one of the locks in Littleborough.

Todmorden to Rochdale West Summit

Miles 3.9, Locks: 18

Total Miles 202.8, Total Locks: 215